The Fourth R -- Religious Education in Sweden and the United States

THE FOURTH R—RELIGIOUS EDUCATION IN SWEDEN AND THE USA
BERNHARD ERLING
This comparison between Sweden and the USA concentrates attention especially on the religious education provided in the public sector for the children of all the citizens. Conrad Bergendoff, to whom this essay is dedicated, has devoted his life to church related higher education, first as dean of Augustana Theological Seminary, then president of Augustana College and Theological Seminary, and, after the two institutions were separated, president of Augustana College. Most Lutheran church related higher education has presupposed the education offered in the public schools. Though the Augustana Synod did for a time maintain some schools offering secondary education, the public schools were accepted for elementary education and also for secondary education, when this became generally available.1 It was thought that the Church and the home could provide the religious education that in the USA was not being offered in the public schools. There is reason to question whether this way of providing for religious education is any longer wholly adequate. Despite the great value of what can be accomplished in the home and the local congregation, not all parents do provide sufficient religious teaching in the home, and it is extremely difficult to find sufficient time to teach all that should be taught in church sponsored religious education classes. Furthermore, too many American children are not enrolled in these classes, while many who are, fail to attend them regularly. The same is true in varying degrees for other religious groups in the American society. Some would ask, therefore, whether an effort should not be made to incorporate to a much greater extent religious education also in the public school curriculum.
For both Sweden and the USA including religious education in the curriculum of the public schools has posed a problem due to the fact of religious pluralism. These two countries have responded to this problem in different ways. The USA has sought to remove religious content as much as possible from public education, whereas Sweden has, especially in recent years, developed a curriculum that takes into account this pluralism, instructs pupils about it, and also helps them define what their own faith orientation is to be. In what follows, the account of religious education in Sweden will be given first, thereaf­ter
what has happened with respect to this aspect of the curriculum in the USA. There will then be some concluding observations.
I
During the past four hundred years, three phases concerning religious education in Sweden can be distinguished: first, a period marked by strong efforts to achieve and maintain religious unity; second, a period during which the insistence on religious unity was gradually and slowly relaxed; and third, a time in recent decades when an attempt has been and is being made to adapt the curriculum of the Swedish public schools to the implications of acceptance of religious pluralism for religious education.
Religious Unity in Sweden
While the sixteenth-century Lutheran Reformation in Sweden called for significant changes in religious teaching and practice, it also represented an effort to achieve religious unity. In 1527 it was decreed that everywhere in the kingdom God's word should be preached in its purity. By 1541 a group led by Olavus Petri (who, with his brother, Laurentius Petri, had studied in Wittenberg) completed the translation of the Bible into Swedish. In 1544 a hymnal that also contained Luther's Small Catechism was published. In 1571 Laurentius Petri, then archbishop of Uppsala, wrote an evangelical church order (which also included Sweden's first school order), establishing a norm for liturgical practice and polity. Though there was no specific reference to confessions, preaching the gospel was defined as preaching forgiveness of sins in the name of Jesus Christ, and in relation thereto preaching repentance.
Problems arose as after Laurentius Petri's death in 1573 King Johan III introduced a controversial liturgy, bringing back certain Roman Catholic practices. There were, furthermore, fears when the king died in 1592 that his son, Sigismund, who had been strongly influenced by his Polish Roman Catholic mother and who was already king of Roman Catholic Poland, might try to promote the Counter-Reformation in Sweden. Those who wanted Sigismund to be required at his coronation to promise to rule in accord with an evangelical confession organized the Uppsala Assembly, which met from 1-20 March 1593. It was proposed that Sweden adopt the Augsburg Confession, which was read and discussed article by article. When it was finally adopted the chairman of the assembly exclaimed, "Now has Sweden become one man, and we all have one Lord and God!"2
At his coronation Sigismund promised to rule in accord with the Augsburg Confession. He continued to reside in Poland, delegating authority in Sweden to a regent, his uncle, Duke Karl. Disagreement between the two developed and in 1598 King Sigismund attacked Duke Karl's forces and was defeated at the battle of Stångebro. As a result the following year Sigismund lost the crown of Sweden and Karl ruled in his place, though he did not agree to coronation until 1607. King Karl IX was succeeded at his death in 1611 by his son, Gustaf II Adolf. A series of laws and decrees in 1604 (Norrköpings arvförening), 1617 (Örebro stadga), and 1634 (1634 års regeringsreform), stipulated that the kingdom required unity in religion and that any crown prince who fell away from God's pure word and the unaltered Augsburg Confession would thereby have lost his claim to the throne.3 Later theological controversies between advocates of different interpretations of Lutheran orthodoxy led to a decree in 1663 that departure from pure doctrine, by which was meant the teachings set forth in the Augsburg Confession and interpreted in the other Lutheran confessional writings in the Book of Concord, could be punishable by death. This point of view was later reaffirmed in the Church Law of 1686, which stated that everyone in Sweden, as well as in lands subject to its crown, should confess the pure evangelical doctrine as defined in the Lutheran confessions. Those failing to confess this faith should be exiled. In the Church Law of 1686, which though revised in various ways was to remain in force for 300 years, it was presupposed that Swedish society was a unity and that the Church of Sweden included the whole population. The church was accordingly firmly in control of education. While there was not yet obligatory education for all the citizens, it was deemed desirable that people should be enabled to understand the doctrine taught in the church. Pastors were required to preach catechetical sermons and to know the members of their parishes well enough so that they could indicate in the church books the degree of each person's understand­ing
of Christianity.4 The first threat to this religious unity in Sweden came during the early eighteenth century from pietism. The word's original meaning was negative and referred to what was regarded as excessive, exaggerated piety, more especially individualistic forms of piety that emerged in opposition to the collective church life of orthodoxy. Pietistic movements developed throughout Europe and the pietism that came to Sweden had its origins in Germany. Students who had studied at German universities, especially at the University of Halle, a center of German pietism, came home as its zealous promoters. Soldiers who fought for Charles XII and became prisoners of war read pietist devotional writings during their imprisonment. After release from prison they came home bringing with them this literature.5 What troubled the authorities was that the pietists met in small groups and it was impossible to tell whether the ideas they shared were theologically acceptable.
In 1726 the Swedish government issued the Conventicle Decree. It was based on the statement in the Church Law of 1686 that strictly forbade "conceiving and spreading any misleading ideas." The decree forbade persons, whether members of the local parish or of other parishes, few or many, to meet in homes in the absence of a pastor under the pretext of having devotions, or, more specifically, to hold a service. The intent was to preserve unity in religion. To contribute to this end pastors were instructed to hold cottage meetings to examine the faith of the people, which led to the development of what were known as husförhör (catechetical meetings held in homes throughout a parish). A negative consequence of the Conventicle Decree was that lay people were kept from participating in church activities, which drove Swedish pietism in more radical directions.
Religious Unity Requirement Gradually Relaxed
The Conventicle Decree did make an exception for foreigners of the Anglican and Reformed faiths, and in 1741 these denominations received permission to build churches in port cities. This tolerance was widened in 1781-82 to include the whole kingdom and all Christian foreigners, as well as Jews. Despite efforts to gain even greater religious freedom and some movement in this direction in the Constitution of 1809, it was not until 1858 that the Conventicle Decree was repealed.
During the nineteenth century there was further relaxation of the rigor of the legislation designed to insure religious unity in Sweden. In 1860 the law stipulating punishment for those who departed from the pure evangelical doctrine was repealed and the possibility to withdraw from the Church of Sweden was granted. Permission was also given to form one's own Christian congregation, if the king gave his consent. The person who wanted to withdraw was, however, to be taught, exhorted, and warned both by the pastor of his congrega­tion
and the cathedral chapter. In 1873 the requirements for with­drawing
from the Church of Sweden were modified so that a waiting period of two months replaced the requirement of being taught, exhorted, and warned about what withdrawal would mean. In 1892 the only condition for the right to withdraw was that one had to indicate the Christian communion one was entering, though this communion did not need to be one already recognized by the state.
During the nineteenth century a number of free churches, whose doctrine, administration, and economy were not dependent on the state, were organized, some as a result of Anglo-American influenc­es.
The first Baptist congregation was organized in 1848 and in 1873 the first Methodist Episcopal congregation was organized. In 1878 the Swedish Mission Covenant was organized, a free church that grew out of the Evangelical National Foundation, a movement for renewal within the Church of Sweden. In part the stimulus that led to the formation of this denomination was a doctrinal controversy over Paul Peter Waldenstrom's interpretation of the doctrine of the atonement. He insisted that the New Testament did not teach that Jesus' death was necessary in order to turn aside God's wrath directed against the sinner. Waldenstrom taught that a loving God was always ready freely to forgive the sinner. At this point he took issue with the Lutheran confessions and as a result the Mission Covenant in its constitution did not adopt any confessions, basing its teaching simply on the Holy Scriptures.6
Religious Education and Religious Pluralism
General public education began in Sweden in 1842 with the introduction of the obligatory folk school. The church strongly supported public education so that the laity might be enabled to read the Bible and the catechism. These schools provided the setting for the church's catechetical instruction, the teaching of evangelical Lutheran doctrine, with its goal of forming persons into Christian members of society. The diocesan cathedral chapters were responsible for the preparation of teachers, while in the parishes the education provided was given under the supervision of the senior pastor. It was not until 1930 that the supervision of these schools became a communal rather than a churchly affair.7
The first adaptation of the religious education curriculum to the religious pluralism that had developed in Sweden, occurred in 1919 when it was decided to remove Luther's Small Catechism from the folk school religious education curriculum.8 By this time it was recognized that various groups, such as the labor movement, the temperance movement, and the free churches all had a legitimate interest in the schools. The non-confessional stance of the Mission Covenant and the Baptists contributed to the decision. While the school was to remain Christian, it was to have a more general religious orientation. In the place of the Catechism greater stress was to be placed on biblical texts, especially those imparting moral teaching that would be acceptable to all. Much attention was given to the Sermon on the Mount. The aim of this education was to promote moral development.
In the decades that followed, two important problems were considered: the question of religious freedom and the question of how to develop a curriculum that could be common for all. Two important reports dealt with these questions, the 1940 skolutredning (school investigation) and the 1946 skolkommission (school commis­sion).
The 1940 report took note of the 1919 curricular plan and stressed Christianity as a communal factor that could contribute to the nurture of citizens. Pupils were therefore not only to be taught empirically verifiable facts but should be given an experience of how important the religious and historical fellowship is. The 1946 report, on the other hand, stressed the ideals of democratization and secularization. It regarded religion as a private affair. Ethical nurture should not be related to a particular religious-ethical ideal, but to a more general humanistic one. No single ethical alternative should be preferred, but several options should be presented with the decision being made by the individual, concerning both personal and social issues. At the same time it was presupposed that the instruction would indicate the community's need for such ethical norms as honesty, helpfulness, and the willingness to cooperate.9
The next important date concerning religious education in Sweden is the 1951 law granting the right of unconditional withdrawal from the Church of Sweden. The Swedish Parliament (riksdag) had expressed
itsel
f in favor of such a law in 1909 and the bishops and the church assembly had given their support to this idea in 1929, but not until 1951 was this law enacted. The right to teach Christianity in the public schools was given to members of a specified list of Swedish denominations, as well as to those who in writing stated that they did not hold views in conflict with the teachings of evangelical Christianity. There was discussion of whether one could teach independently of one's own convictional orientation and there began to be reference to objective religious education. Further implications of the 1951 religious freedom law were drawn in 1962 when the nine-year Comprehensive School (grundskolan) was established and received its first curricular plan. According to this plan the school became non-confessional and the Church of Sweden no longer had any formal influence on the school. Pupils were to be given informa­tion
about Christianity and other religions. The plan stated that the instruction was to be objective.
With regard to the development from 1919 to 1962, in the former year Christianity was accepted as providing the primary motivation for the communal ethic. One sought to interpret Christianity in such a way that it could be accepted by as many as possible. In 1962 (even though statistically for most of the population Christianity was still the basis for the communal ethic) as secularization had progressed, the fact that many were choosing to base the communal ethic on other convictional orientations was also recognized. It was assumed, however, that all could agree about certain fundamental democratic values. The Curricular Plan (läroplan för grundskolan, 1962) stated:
Through its ethical nurture the school shall give the pupil a good understanding of the moral norms which must apply as people live together and which undergird the order of law in a democratic community. He must become fully conscious of the meaning of ethical concepts such as justice, honesty, consideration and tolerance, and of the consequences of infractions against laws and precepts.... The main task of the social nurture, which the school's teaching is also to include, is to awaken respect for truth and justice, for human dignity, for inviolability of human life and thereby for the right to personal integrity.10
In 1969 the Comprehensive School received its second Curricular Plan (Igr 69). What had been called "teaching about Christianity" now was renamed "teaching about religion." The requirement that the instruction be objective remained. It was to be factual and compre­hensive
and give such knowledge that the pupil be able to choose from among different life orientations. The school itself was to be neutral.
In the Curricular Plan of 1980 there was a new development in . that religious education was to concentrate on the pupils' life questions, as well as matters having to do with the environment. Pupils were to receive "a widened understanding of the Christian religion with the Bible in the center," but at the same time they should be enabled to compare the Christian heritage with other religious traditions, so that they could see how basic vital questions are answered in the context of different life orientations. That there are valuable contributions in the religious traditions many immi­grants
have brought to Sweden was to be acknowledged. The values of other cultures were to be respected, though anything that strives against the basic values of Swedish democracy was to be resisted.11 Sweden has responded to the fact that immigrants have brought with them many different religious traditions. In the last three grades (7-9) of the Comprehensive School, religion has been included in the field of social studies, which also include social science, history, religion, and geography. In a two-volume textbook combining these different subjects, written for the seventh and eighth grades by Arne Lindquist and Jan Wester, besides Christianity the following religions are studied: Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, religions of China and Japan, and primitive religions.12 Sven-Åke Selander points out that in the curricular plans from 1962 to 1980 there was a develop­ment
from a closed to an open curriculum, from concentrating on Christianity to concentrating on community. Whereas earlier one had sought scientifically to describe and objectively to present Chris­tianity,
one now sought to describe and present religion and life orientation. In the place of terms such as "God," one now used more open ones such as "life."13
The most recent development is to be found the Curricular Plan of 1994." Its name has been changed from the "Curricular Plan for the Comprehensive School and the Gymnasium" to the "Curricular Plan for the Obligatory School System and the Voluntary School Forms." The plan opens with this statement of basic values:
The public school system rests on the basis of democracy. . . The school has an important task to transmit and make secure in the pupils the values that our social life rests upon. The inviolability of human life, the freedom and integrity of the individual, the equal value of all persons, the equality of women and men, as well as solidarity with the weak and the vulnerable, are the values that the school shall form and transmit. In accordance with the ethic prescribed by Christian tradition and Western humanism this happens through the individual's nurture toward a sense of justice, generosity, tolerance, and taking responsibility. The instruction in the school shall be non-confessional. The task of the school is to let each pupil find her/his unique identity and thereby be able to participate in the life of the community through giving her/his best in responsible freedom.15
Swedish curricular plans contain course descriptions. Somewhat new in 1994 as far as religion is concerned, is that both the content of religious knowledge and its existential aspect are to be held together. Pupils are to be given the possibility to use their own reflections and questions in working with existential and ethical problems so as to be able to arrive at a position of their own. They are to be made acquainted with the Christian tradition but also with such alternatives to the traditional religions as agnostic and atheistic life orientations.16 Selander states that there has been development in the understanding of objectivity from the interpretation in the 1960s, that one could not influence the pupils, to the view that one may now help them with their problems as they think about what life orientation they have or would want to have. One does not prescribe what the choice should be; objectivity consists in helping pupils with problems that arise as they think about these matters. At the same time one provides factual and comprehensive information about the alternatives that might be considered. Selander also states that in this new curricular plan the religion requirement at the gymnasium level (grades 10-12), where there are a number of programs among which pupils may choose, has been increased so that those attending schools offering vocational instruction will also study religion. These students were formerly not required to study this subject during their last three years. The older conception that a Swedish understanding of democracy was sufficient as a basis for ethical behavior has, furthermore, been questioned. It is now being recognized that the religious as well as non-religious foundations on which the idea of Swedish democracy rests should be studied by all the pupils, whichever of the options they choose for the last three years of the one-to-twelve-year educational system.17
Quite clearly Sweden has come a long way in the 400 years since the Uppsala Assembly of 1593, when significant religious unity was achieved. During the last two centuries pluralism in faith and life orientations has developed in this Nordic country. Along with the Church of Sweden there are several free churches. Marxism, human­ism,
and atheism have been proposed as viable life orientations and recent immigration has brought religions such as Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism to Sweden. Nonetheless the nation continues to require the inclusion of religious education throughout its twelve-year public educational system.
II
When Sweden and the United States are compared, it must at the outset be stated that there is no event in American history like the Uppsala Assembly of 1593, when for Sweden the Lutheran interpreta­tion
of Christianity became established. Instead, the USA has come to adopt the principle that religion should as much as possible be separated from the governmental process and consequently also from education that is publicly supported. This latter implication of the nonestablishment principle was not at first fully recognized. In order to understand how the principle of nonestablishment came to imply the exclusion of the study of religion from public education, we must examine the history of education in the USA.
The story begins with the colonial period. Prior to the American Revolution, there were three main divisions in the European settle­ment
on the east coast of North America: the New England, the Middle, and the Southern colonies. The New England colonies were settled by dissenters from the Church of England, who thought of themselves as a new Israel with a divine commission to establish a godly commonwealth in the American wilderness. Early on they established schools. Boston Latin School dates back to 1635 and Harvard University, the oldest one in North America, was founded in 1636. The spirit of the Puritan founders of Harvard is expressed in these words:
After God had carried us safe to New England, and wee had builded our houses, provided necessaries for our livelihood, rear'd convenient places for God's worship and settled the Civill Government; One of the next things we longed for, and looked after, was to advance Learning and perpetuate it to Posterity; dreading to leave an illiterate Ministry to the churches, when our present ministers shall lie in the dust.18
In the Middle colonies there was much less homogeneity in the population. In New York and Delaware there were remnants of Dutch and Swedish colonies that had been taken over by the British. In Pennsylvania many Germans had settled. While all of these groups were Protestant, in Maryland there were Roman Catholics. The absence of a common language and the lack of religious uniformity made it difficult to establish common schools, as in New England. The elementary education that was to be found, was provided in private schools or by the different religious groups in each communi­ty.
It took much longer in the Middle colonies to establish institutions of higher education. The oldest university in this section of the country is Princeton, founded in 1746, more than a century after the founding of Harvard.
In the Southern colonies the dominant church during the colonial period was the established Church of England. Here the College of William and Mary was founded in Williamsburg, Virginia, in 1693. There were, however, three problems that the Southern colonies faced. The nature of the first settlements was quite different from those in New England. Those who sponsored these settlements were primarily interested in financial profits that were to be returned to England. The earliest immigrants in Virginia have been described as "alumni of the Elizabethan and Jacobean culture of poverty, who had no intention of working, who squabbled with each other and fought with the Indians, and who died of mysterious diseases."19 When later a plantation economy based on tobacco and slavery developed, families lived on large land holdings and were scattered over large areas, so that it was difficult to form either congregations or schools for the children. Finally, during and after the Revolutionary War, the identification of the Church of England with the British government, against which the colonists had revolted, weakened its influence in these colonies. The Church had, however, not given much attention to education and the State did not consider education its responsibili­ty,
either. There were tutors in homes, some small private schools, and a few pauper schools for children of the poorer classes.20
These differences between the colonies help explain why the dominant influence in the formation of early American culture during the colonial period and for some time thereafter came from Puritan New England. In much of New England the Congregational churches were established, in the sense that they were publicly supported and linked with the government of each local community. In Massachu­setts
they so remained until 1833. Though the Church of England was established in some of the other colonies, as far as the nation itself was concerned, it was evident that the model of a federal ecclesiasti­cal
establishment would not be acceptable. Immediately upon the adoption of the federal Constitution, Congress proposed ten amend­ments,
known as the Bill of Rights. The first of these begins: "Con­gress
shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."21 It is through this amendment, adopted in 1791, that separation of church and state has come to characterize American society.
Two things should be noted about this section of the First Amendment. First, when it was adopted it applied only to the federal government. In 1791 only Virginia and Rhode Island had full disestablishment,22 though there was a growing number of Americans who belonged to religious groups, such as the Baptists, who in Europe had experienced suppression from established churches and who were opposed in principle to granting one religious group the privilege and power that establishment would provide. Thus, while this amendment did not make such a church-state relationship illegal on the state level, it was perhaps inevitable that the nonestablishment principle, due to increasing religious pluralism, would eventually be extended to the states. As new states adopted constitutions, many of them borrowed this language from the federal Constitution. The second thing to be noted is that no thought had been given to the implications of the nonestablishment principle as far as education was concerned. There is no reference to education in either the federal Constitution or the Federalist Papers. In the Middle and Southern states education was provided, for the most part, either in private or parish schools; it is possible that no extensive involvement of even local government in the educational process was anticipated. In New England, where there were publicly supported common schools, it was understood that the First Amendment applied only to the federal government, which had not yet begun to concern itself with educa­tion.
23
New England, despite the strict Calvinism of its established Congregational churches, was not immune to the religious pluralism that was beginning to make itself felt throughout all the states. The Puritan requirement of experienced conversion for full church membership had been changed so that there could be a "half-way covenant" for those who were baptized but had not been converted. This half-way covenant did. not admit them to holy communion but did permit them to have their children baptized. In the middle of the 18th century a revival, the Great Awakening, swept through the colonies dividing old denominations and creating new ones. Some theologians, who reacted negatively to certain aspects of the revival, took a more optimistic view of human nature than was taught by the orthodox Calvinists. They also stressed the humanity of Jesus and began to question the doctrine of the Trinity. This kind of thinking eventually led to division in the Congregational churches in eastern Massachusetts so that most of them became Unitarian. All of this obviously resulted in considerable doctrinal controversy.24
Some of the defenders of orthodoxy were unwise in their strict interpretation of Calvinism. One of them, Nathanael Emmons, was minister in Franklin, Massachusetts, for fifty-four years. In his rural parish lived the family of Horace Mann, who was to be the first secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education. In 1810, when Horace was 14 years old, his older brother, Stephen, drowned on a Sunday, having failed to attend the service that day. At his funeral Nathanael Emmons spoke of the terrible last judgment and the lake that burns with fire and brimstone and left no doubt as to Stephen's eternal fate. Horace reacted strongly against such teaching and later became a Unitarian25 In 1827, probably in reaction to the doctrinal controversies that attended the emergence of the Unitarian denomina­tion
in 1825, the Massachusetts legislature enacted a law stating that the Committee on Education "shall never direct any school books to be purchased or used, in any schools under their superintendence, which are calculated to favor any particular religious sect or tenet."26 Horace Mann became secretary of the Board of Education in 1837. He was in full agreement with the 1827 law and proposed that in the place of sectarian doctrines, ethics and only what can be known about God through a study of nature be taught in the common schools. With respect to Christianity, he argued that, since its teachings must be found in the Bible, reading the Bible without comment or interpre­tation
should be sufficient.27
Horace Mann's way of solving the problem of defining the religious element in public education set the pattern for public schools in other parts of the nation. Not everyone was satisfied. Some thought that what Mann said should be taught about religion, sounded too Unitarian. Those least satisfied were Roman Catholics, who through immigration were becoming increasingly numerous. They regarded the common Christianity being taught in the public schools as a watered-down Protestantism. The King James Version of the Bible that was being read was to them a Protestant Bible. As to reading it without comment, Roman Catholics insisted that to understand the Bible one needed the guidance of the church.28
Roman Catholics proposed that instead of common schools there should be tax support for confessional schools, chosen according to parental preference. This proposal the Protestants opposed, since they felt that common schools were essential to achieve national unity. In order, however, to make the public schools as acceptable as possible to the Roman Catholics, Protestants agreed to the removal of more and more explicit religious content from the curriculum. This did not satisfy the Roman Catholics; where they could, especially in urban areas, they established their own schools. A few other denominations, among them some Lutherans, have done the same. Most Protestants, however, have supported the public school, since they have felt that the home and the local congregation could adequately supplement the education received in the public school.
In the development thus far surveyed, it should be emphasized that there was no intentional exclusion of religious teaching as such from the public schools. It was taken for granted that religion belonged in public education, but those in charge of the public schools simply could not cope with the problem of religious plural­ism.
Almost all specific religious teaching appeared to be sectarian and thus it was feared that teaching it under state auspices would violate someone's rights of conscience.
While the nonestablishment of religion provision in the federal Constitution was, as indicated above, often written into state constitutions, it was through the 14th Amendment adopted in 1868 that this principle was made applicable in all the states. The 14th Amendment had as its purpose to make certain that individual southern states would not deprive the recently freed slaves of the rights that should, following their emancipation, be theirs as free United States citizens. While this amendment did not effectively safeguard the rights of black citizens, it has in this century provided the basis for important civil rights decisions. The United States Supreme Court interpreted the 14th Amendment to mean that all the rights and freedoms provided in the other amendments, which had originally referred only to the federal government, could now be claimed in all the other governmental jurisdictions. Thus the federal nonestablishment principle became applicable not only to all the states, whether their constitutions contained such a provision or not, but also to each local school board.
Within the last fifty years this implication of the 14th Amendment has led to a series of changes as far as religion in the public schools is concerned. Suits have been filed by parents who have claimed that the rights of their children have been violated by released time religious education classes held on school premises,29 by the recitation of a prayer prescribed by the state board of education,30 or by the reading without comment of some verses from the Bible each day.31 This latter Schempp Decision of 17 June 1963, in which the Supreme Court ruled that Pennsylvania law may not require the reading of at least ten verses from the Holy Bible without comment at the opening of each public school on each school day, has had a somewhat unexpected consequence. Mr. Justice Tom Clark in stating the decision observed that education is not complete without a knowl­edge
of the history of religion, comparative religion, and the Bible. He added: "Nothing that we have said here indicates that such study of the Bible or of religion, when presented objectively as part of a secular program of education, may not be effected consistent with the First Amendment."32
A decade earlier a report issued in 1951 by the Educational Policies Commission of the National Educational Association of the US and the American Association of School Administrators stated that there should be teaching about moral and spiritual values in the public schools:
The American people have rightly expected the schools of this country to teach moral and spiritual values. The schools have
accepted this responsibility No society can survive without
a moral order. A system of moral and spiritual values is indispensable to group living.33
Ten values were listed: 1) The supreme importance of individual personality. 2) Each person should accept moral responsibility. 3) Institutions are the servants of mankind. 4) Mutual consent is better than violence. 5) The human mind should be liberated by access to information and opinion. 6) Excellence in mind, character, and creative ability should be fostered. 7) All persons should be judged by the same moral standards. 8) Brotherhood should take precedence over selfish interest. 9) Each person should have the greatest possible opportunity for the pursuit of happiness, provided only that such activities do not substantially interfere with the similar opportunities of others. 10) Each person should be offered the emotional and spiritual experiences which transcend the materialistic aspects of life.34 The Report went on to state:
American democracy cannot select any system of religious faith as the sole basis for the values to which all Americans sub­scribe.
Nevertheless these moral and spiritual values them­selves
command, with minor exceptions, the allegiance of all thoughtful Americans. . . . However we may disagree on religious creeds, we can agree on moral and spiritual values. . . . The public schools should teach all children a decent respect for the religious opinions of mankind and the basic facts concerning the role of religion in the history and culture of mankind. . . . There can be no doubt that the American democracy is grounded in a religious tradition. While religion may not be the only source for democratic moral and religious values, it is surely one of the important sources.35
III
Given the statements in the Report of the Educational Policies Commission, which are similar to what one finds in Swedish curricular plans, and the opinion of Mr. Justice Clark in the Schempp Decision, that objective study of the Bible or of religion in the public schools can be consistent with the First Amendment, why is there nonetheless such a difference between Swedish and American public education with respect to teaching in this area?36 The major reason for the difference is that such teaching can be controversial and those who make decisions about curricular matters in American public schools want as much as possible to avoid controversy. A contribut­ing
factor is that American public education is extremely decentral­ized.
Each state has its own department of education that sets general standards and administers state aid to local school districts, while more specific decisions about the curriculum are made in the local school district. Local school boards are very responsive to parental pressure, fearful of becoming vulnerable to lawsuits, and worried lest negative community attitudes could result in defeat of referendums to authorize needed additional funding. There are strong reasons, therefore, to avoid any teaching with which parents in the district might not agree.
The situation is quite different, however, in Sweden. There decisions about the curriculum are made and enforced nationally. Recently Sweden's Supreme Administrative Court required the Östergötland County Council to remove wording about Christian ethics it had introduced into the curricular plan for the schools of that county. The County Council was told that in revising the language of the national curricular plan it had exceeded its authority.37 The court decision did not mean that there was not to be teaching about Christian ethics but that the description of such teaching for the schools of Östergötland County had to correspond to the description in the national curricular plan.
On the American scene how controversial moral education can be, is clearly seen when sex education is considered. Despite the need for such education, given the rise of teen-age pregnancy and the spread of AIDS,38 it is extremely difficult to introduce this subject into the public school curriculum. Even with sex education being excluded, proponents of a legislative program called "Contract with America," presently being advanced by Republicans in the US House of Representatives, are in effect saying that there is now too much controversial moral education in the public schools. The Contract states that it is through the family that values such as responsibility, morality, commitment, and faith are learned, and that values of the family are under attack from the education establishment. The Contract therefore proposes legislation to "strengthen the rights of parents to protect their children against education programs that undermine the values taught in the home."39 Pitting families and schools against each other on the issue of moral education is extremely unfortunate, for moral education, whether it is so called or not, cannot successfully be excluded from public education. In Shakespeare's play The Merchant of Venice, Shylock has to realize that he cannot cut from Antonio a pound of flesh without also shedding blood. So also religious and ethical questions are implicit throughout all the areas of general education. Moral education should be a cooperative enterprise in which parents, churches and their functional equivalents, and schools all participate. Ways must be found to develop meaningful dialogue on the issues involved so that "culture war" can be avoided.40
An important question in this connection is whether all moral education need be prescriptive. In the case of moral norms, such as honesty, respect for human dignity, acceptance of individual responsibility, the school can be prescriptive in its teaching. Norms of this kind are noncontroversial and without there being explicit reference to moral education, there is teaching about them throughout the curriculum. With respect to some other moral issues, differing possible options must be considered. Examples of such issues are: Asking whether national self-interest should be the primary consider­ation
in US relations with Third World nations. Does justice have the same meaning for all US citizens? How can the often claimed right of the individual to bear arms be related to the inviolability of human life? What is meant by human life; when does human life that should be held inviolable begin and when does it end? Is equality between women and men a goal toward which any society should strive? What should be done to remove what remains of discrimina­tory
practices against racial and other minorities? To examine questions of this kind can be controversial. Objectivity here requires that the teaching be factual and as comprehensive as possible.
One way to deal with controversial moral differences is to recognize the extent to which they are rooted in differences in religious faith. If this is to be done, moral education must also include teaching about religion. A helpful way to understand the importance of religion for the common life of a community is to compare the community to a tree. The roots that support the more visible trunk and leafy branches are the differing faiths to be found in the community. That there are several such roots can be a source of strength rather than weakness. The trunk is the de facto moral consensus that enables the citizens to live and work together. This consensus must again and again be renegotiated. The leafy branches are the differences in both religious practice and moral behavior that in a pluralistic society are permitted to flourish. Religious faith that is foundational in any society has a dual relationship with moral behavior. On the one hand, some moral imperatives derive directly from religious faith. It can be helpful in deliberations about moral issues to know how this derivation occurs, why one faith calls for one kind of moral behavior and why another prompts different moral judgments. Another relationship between religious faith and moral behavior, is that faith provides the individual with the motive to do what she/he is persuaded is good or right.
Three distinctively different kinds of motivation for moral behavior are: 1) One is motivated by sanctions, the threat of pun­ishment
if one does what is wrong, the hope for reward if one does what is right. While these sanctions here and now are administered by the society in which one lives, one believes that behind them is a transcendent lawgiver, who will ultimately correct earthly sanctions insofar as they are in error and reward or punish either in this life or in a life to come. 2) One is motivated by self-interest and believes the world is so ordered that through diligent effort one's desires for various goods can be satisfied. One conforms to the ethical norms of the community in which one lives in order to be successful in one's striving. With respect to the similar striving of others one may believe that there is an invisible hand that brings forth from the self-interested striving of the many the greatest good of all. There can also be a negative form of this faith. If one is convinced human desire for the most part cannot be satisfied, the appropriate behavior is to curb it and even seek to root it out. 3) One is motivated by gratitude. One believes that one has been loved, by parents and many others, ultimately by the presence in history of a transcendent, redemptive and creative community-forming love. This love defines one's obligations and provides guidance as to how one satisfies one's own desires and responds to the desires of others.41 These different kinds of motivation represent different ways of answering the fundamental religious question, What do/may I/we believe and hope? The question as formulated implies that one already does believe and hope in some way, but it is also possible that this convictional orientation could change, for there are several viable religious options. The two verbs "believe" and "hope" are needed because we believe in the present (which belief may also involve an interpretation of the past), but we also anticipate with more or less hope the future, no matter how distantly that future may be projected. Many people are not fully conscious of how they are actually answering this fundamental religious question. A part of the educational task is to help them gain self-knowledge at this point. As this is done it is essential to recognize that the religious question can be answered in a number of fundamentally different ways.
It should be possible in public education to examine the possible answers to the religious question, especially as they relate to the possible answers to the ethical question (What should/ought I/we do?). It will be helpful if there is general agreement by all that these questions must in fact be answered by everyone. Just as it is impossible to be amoral, in the sense that one simply ignores the moral question, so, if the religious question is as broadly defined as proposed above, everyone believes and hopes in some way. Since the options suggested above are faith options, no one of them is "true" to the exclusion of the others. They are also rationally incommensurable, there being no common standard in terms of which they can be evaluated. How the options differ can be recognized and each person finds herself/himself believing and hoping in one or another of the ways indicated. At the same time, despite the significant differences between the faith and hope options, and the moral implications derived from them, a de facto moral consensus can be defined so as to make possible communal life. Education in the public sector about religion and ethics can help to define this consensus, thus contribut­ing
to the necessary unity communal life requires. It can also have the effect of strengthening particular faith communities. In a religiously pluralistic society there is much to gain if there is objective teaching about religion and ethics both in the public schools and in its various religious communities.
Notes
1 G. Everett Arden, Augustana Heritage: A History of the Augustana Lutheran Church (Rock Island, Ill.: Augustana Press, 1963), 106.
2 Knut B. Westman, Uppsala möte och dess betydelse (Stockholm: Svenska kyrkans diakonistyrelses bokförlag, 1943), 22.
'Much of what follows on the effort to maintain religious unity in Sweden, as well as the subsequent progress toward religious freedom is derived from Åke Andrén, "Religionsfrihet," Nordisk teologisk uppslagsbok (hereafter abbreviated as NTU), III, 290-293.
4 Eje Berling, "Skolväsen," Svensk uppslagsbok, vol. 26, 346-348. 'Hilding Pleijel, "Pietism," NTU, III, 57-63.
'William Bredberg, "Svenska Missionsförbundet" and "Paul Peter Waldenström," NTU, III, 731-735, 1099-1103.
'Birgit Lehndahls, Religion i skolan - men hur? (Uppsala: EFS förlaget, 1986), 65-66; Ejje Berling, op cit, 350.
8 For a summary account of the development in Swedish religious education from 1919-1980, see Birgit Lehndahls, op. cit., 66-67. For a more detailed discussion, see Karl-Göran Algotsson, Från katekestvång till religionsfrihet. Debatten om religionsunder­visningen
i skolan under 1900-talet, Skrifter utgivna av Statsvetenskapliga Föreningen i Uppsala, nr. 70, 1975.
9 Sven-Åke Selander, Religionsundervisning för hela människan. Analys av samspelet samhälle, människosyn, innehall och metoder i religionsundervisningen i Sverige (Lund: Lunds Universitet, Lärarhögskolan i Malmö, utvecklingsarbete och fältförsök, 22,1982), 67-68. I wish to express my deep appreciation to Sven-Åke Selander, who has been of great assistance to me in preparing this article, through correspondence and the literature he has sent me. Professor Selander formerly taught at Lund University's Teachers College and now teaches in its Theological Faculty.
10 Selander, 1982, 99-100. Selander cites the 1962 läroplan för grundskolan, 16,18. "läroplan för grundskolan 1980 (Stockholm: Liber UtbildningsFörlaget, 1980), 121. "Arne Lindquist & Jan Wester, SAMS (Örebro: Esselte studium, 1987-88), vol. 1-2. "Selander, 1982,134.
14 Läroplan för det obligatoriska skolväsendet och de frivilliga skolformerna, Lpo-Lpf 94, Statens skolverks författningssamling (SKOLFS) 1994. aIbid., 5. "Ibid., 38-39.
17 From personal correspondence with Professor Selander, 31 December 1994, and 12 February 1995.
""Harvard University," Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1964, vol. 11,137.
19 The description is taken from a brief review of Jamestown: 1544-1699 by Carl Bridenbaugh (Oxford), in The New Yorker, vol. 56 (14 April 1980), 175.
20 Ellwood P. Cubberley, "Education: United States," Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1941, vol. 7, 991.
21 The Constitution of the United States, Amendment 1.
22 David B. Tyack, "Church-State Relations in Education, History," The Encyclopedia of Education (Macmillan and Free Press, 1971), vol. 2, 114.
23 It can be noted that Massachusetts and Connecticut were two of the three states that failed to ratify the ten amendments that form the Bill of Rights, Massachusetts not doing so until 1941, the 150th anniversary of the Bill of Rights' ratification. Alfred H. Kelley and Winfrid A. Harbison, The American Constitution, Its Origin and Development, 4th ed. (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1970), 176; Broadus Mitchell and Louise Pearson Mitchell, A Biography of the Constitution of the United States (New York: Oxford U. Press, 1964), p. 204.
24 For a more detailed account of this development, see Sydney E. Ahlstrom, A Religious History of the American People (New Haven: Yale U. Press, 1972), 387-403.
25 William Kailer Dunn, What Happened to Religious Education? (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1958), 122-126. Raymond B. Culver, Horace Mann and Religion in the Massachusetts Public Schools (New Haven: Yale U. Press, 1929), 226-227, states that Dr. Emmons addressed in his funeral sermon the subject of "dying unconverted," implying that this had happened in Stephen's case.
26 Dunn, op. cit., 104.
27 Ibid., 141,149
28 Ibid., 267-270.
291948 Illinois ex rel. McCullum v. Board of Education (333 U.S. 203). 301962 Engel v. Vitale (370 U.S. 421).
311963 School District Abington Township v. Schempp (374 U.S. 203) and Murray v. Curlett (374 U.S. 203).
32 (374 U.S. 225), 83A, S. Ct. 1573. See Nicholas Woltersdorff, "Religion in the Public Schools," The Encyclopedia of Education, vol. 7,469, and Clark Spurlock, "Supreme Court of the United States and Education," Ibid., vol. 8, 568.
33 Moral and Spiritual Values in the Public Schools, Educational Policies Commission, National Education Association of the US, and the American Association of School Administrators, Washington, DC, 1951, 3. Among the twenty members of the Educational Policies Commission was Dwight D. Eisenhower, then president of Columbia University.
34 Ibid., 18-29. The elaboration of the eighth value of brotherhood included this statement "Our ideal is the good Samaritan, rattier than the man who asked whether he must be his brother's keeper." 27.
"Ibid., 33, 73. 36 After the Schempp Decision, some efforts were made to introduce objective teaching about religion in some secondary schools. Budgetary restrictions have, however, curtailed these programs in recent years. There has been a greater expansion of religious studies in public universities.
37 Sydsvenska dagbladet snällposten, Malmö, 15 February 1995, A6. This newspaper item was called to my attention by Professor Bo Johnson of the University of Lund.
38See "Remarks by Rep. Newt Gingrich," 11 November 1994. Contract with America, Ed Gillespie & Bob Schellhas, eds. (New York: Time Books, 1994), 182. ^Ibid., 79.
40 A recent news item stated: "Educators and religious parents fighting a bitter 'culture war' over the future of U.S. public schools signed a pledge in Arlington, Va., to tone down their rhetoric and cooperate for children's good. The agreement won't resolve such issues as prayer in school, teaching creationism and sex education. But the 17 groups—from the Christian Coalition to the People for the American Way—pledged to work to solve disputes before they become lawsuits, improve communication and respect each other's positions." Star Tribune, Minneapolis, Minn., 22 March 1995, A7. For a discussion of the phenomenon known as "culture war," see James Davison Hunter, Culture Wars: The Struggle to Define America (New York: Basic Books, 1991).
41 These three patterns of motivation are my interpretation of what Anders Nygren called the nomos, eros, and agape motifs. See Anders Nygren, Agape and Eros, rev. trans. Philip S. Watson (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1953); Bernhard Erling, Nature and History: A Study in Theological Methodology with Special Attention to the Method of Motif Research (Lund: C.W.K. Gleerup, 1960); "Motif Research Analysis and the Existence and Nature of God," Perspective, 10 (1969), 155-67.

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THE FOURTH R—RELIGIOUS EDUCATION IN SWEDEN AND THE USA
BERNHARD ERLING
This comparison between Sweden and the USA concentrates attention especially on the religious education provided in the public sector for the children of all the citizens. Conrad Bergendoff, to whom this essay is dedicated, has devoted his life to church related higher education, first as dean of Augustana Theological Seminary, then president of Augustana College and Theological Seminary, and, after the two institutions were separated, president of Augustana College. Most Lutheran church related higher education has presupposed the education offered in the public schools. Though the Augustana Synod did for a time maintain some schools offering secondary education, the public schools were accepted for elementary education and also for secondary education, when this became generally available.1 It was thought that the Church and the home could provide the religious education that in the USA was not being offered in the public schools. There is reason to question whether this way of providing for religious education is any longer wholly adequate. Despite the great value of what can be accomplished in the home and the local congregation, not all parents do provide sufficient religious teaching in the home, and it is extremely difficult to find sufficient time to teach all that should be taught in church sponsored religious education classes. Furthermore, too many American children are not enrolled in these classes, while many who are, fail to attend them regularly. The same is true in varying degrees for other religious groups in the American society. Some would ask, therefore, whether an effort should not be made to incorporate to a much greater extent religious education also in the public school curriculum.
For both Sweden and the USA including religious education in the curriculum of the public schools has posed a problem due to the fact of religious pluralism. These two countries have responded to this problem in different ways. The USA has sought to remove religious content as much as possible from public education, whereas Sweden has, especially in recent years, developed a curriculum that takes into account this pluralism, instructs pupils about it, and also helps them define what their own faith orientation is to be. In what follows, the account of religious education in Sweden will be given first, thereaf­ter
what has happened with respect to this aspect of the curriculum in the USA. There will then be some concluding observations.
I
During the past four hundred years, three phases concerning religious education in Sweden can be distinguished: first, a period marked by strong efforts to achieve and maintain religious unity; second, a period during which the insistence on religious unity was gradually and slowly relaxed; and third, a time in recent decades when an attempt has been and is being made to adapt the curriculum of the Swedish public schools to the implications of acceptance of religious pluralism for religious education.
Religious Unity in Sweden
While the sixteenth-century Lutheran Reformation in Sweden called for significant changes in religious teaching and practice, it also represented an effort to achieve religious unity. In 1527 it was decreed that everywhere in the kingdom God's word should be preached in its purity. By 1541 a group led by Olavus Petri (who, with his brother, Laurentius Petri, had studied in Wittenberg) completed the translation of the Bible into Swedish. In 1544 a hymnal that also contained Luther's Small Catechism was published. In 1571 Laurentius Petri, then archbishop of Uppsala, wrote an evangelical church order (which also included Sweden's first school order), establishing a norm for liturgical practice and polity. Though there was no specific reference to confessions, preaching the gospel was defined as preaching forgiveness of sins in the name of Jesus Christ, and in relation thereto preaching repentance.
Problems arose as after Laurentius Petri's death in 1573 King Johan III introduced a controversial liturgy, bringing back certain Roman Catholic practices. There were, furthermore, fears when the king died in 1592 that his son, Sigismund, who had been strongly influenced by his Polish Roman Catholic mother and who was already king of Roman Catholic Poland, might try to promote the Counter-Reformation in Sweden. Those who wanted Sigismund to be required at his coronation to promise to rule in accord with an evangelical confession organized the Uppsala Assembly, which met from 1-20 March 1593. It was proposed that Sweden adopt the Augsburg Confession, which was read and discussed article by article. When it was finally adopted the chairman of the assembly exclaimed, "Now has Sweden become one man, and we all have one Lord and God!"2
At his coronation Sigismund promised to rule in accord with the Augsburg Confession. He continued to reside in Poland, delegating authority in Sweden to a regent, his uncle, Duke Karl. Disagreement between the two developed and in 1598 King Sigismund attacked Duke Karl's forces and was defeated at the battle of Stångebro. As a result the following year Sigismund lost the crown of Sweden and Karl ruled in his place, though he did not agree to coronation until 1607. King Karl IX was succeeded at his death in 1611 by his son, Gustaf II Adolf. A series of laws and decrees in 1604 (Norrköpings arvförening), 1617 (Örebro stadga), and 1634 (1634 års regeringsreform), stipulated that the kingdom required unity in religion and that any crown prince who fell away from God's pure word and the unaltered Augsburg Confession would thereby have lost his claim to the throne.3 Later theological controversies between advocates of different interpretations of Lutheran orthodoxy led to a decree in 1663 that departure from pure doctrine, by which was meant the teachings set forth in the Augsburg Confession and interpreted in the other Lutheran confessional writings in the Book of Concord, could be punishable by death. This point of view was later reaffirmed in the Church Law of 1686, which stated that everyone in Sweden, as well as in lands subject to its crown, should confess the pure evangelical doctrine as defined in the Lutheran confessions. Those failing to confess this faith should be exiled. In the Church Law of 1686, which though revised in various ways was to remain in force for 300 years, it was presupposed that Swedish society was a unity and that the Church of Sweden included the whole population. The church was accordingly firmly in control of education. While there was not yet obligatory education for all the citizens, it was deemed desirable that people should be enabled to understand the doctrine taught in the church. Pastors were required to preach catechetical sermons and to know the members of their parishes well enough so that they could indicate in the church books the degree of each person's understand­ing
of Christianity.4 The first threat to this religious unity in Sweden came during the early eighteenth century from pietism. The word's original meaning was negative and referred to what was regarded as excessive, exaggerated piety, more especially individualistic forms of piety that emerged in opposition to the collective church life of orthodoxy. Pietistic movements developed throughout Europe and the pietism that came to Sweden had its origins in Germany. Students who had studied at German universities, especially at the University of Halle, a center of German pietism, came home as its zealous promoters. Soldiers who fought for Charles XII and became prisoners of war read pietist devotional writings during their imprisonment. After release from prison they came home bringing with them this literature.5 What troubled the authorities was that the pietists met in small groups and it was impossible to tell whether the ideas they shared were theologically acceptable.
In 1726 the Swedish government issued the Conventicle Decree. It was based on the statement in the Church Law of 1686 that strictly forbade "conceiving and spreading any misleading ideas." The decree forbade persons, whether members of the local parish or of other parishes, few or many, to meet in homes in the absence of a pastor under the pretext of having devotions, or, more specifically, to hold a service. The intent was to preserve unity in religion. To contribute to this end pastors were instructed to hold cottage meetings to examine the faith of the people, which led to the development of what were known as husförhör (catechetical meetings held in homes throughout a parish). A negative consequence of the Conventicle Decree was that lay people were kept from participating in church activities, which drove Swedish pietism in more radical directions.
Religious Unity Requirement Gradually Relaxed
The Conventicle Decree did make an exception for foreigners of the Anglican and Reformed faiths, and in 1741 these denominations received permission to build churches in port cities. This tolerance was widened in 1781-82 to include the whole kingdom and all Christian foreigners, as well as Jews. Despite efforts to gain even greater religious freedom and some movement in this direction in the Constitution of 1809, it was not until 1858 that the Conventicle Decree was repealed.
During the nineteenth century there was further relaxation of the rigor of the legislation designed to insure religious unity in Sweden. In 1860 the law stipulating punishment for those who departed from the pure evangelical doctrine was repealed and the possibility to withdraw from the Church of Sweden was granted. Permission was also given to form one's own Christian congregation, if the king gave his consent. The person who wanted to withdraw was, however, to be taught, exhorted, and warned both by the pastor of his congrega­tion
and the cathedral chapter. In 1873 the requirements for with­drawing
from the Church of Sweden were modified so that a waiting period of two months replaced the requirement of being taught, exhorted, and warned about what withdrawal would mean. In 1892 the only condition for the right to withdraw was that one had to indicate the Christian communion one was entering, though this communion did not need to be one already recognized by the state.
During the nineteenth century a number of free churches, whose doctrine, administration, and economy were not dependent on the state, were organized, some as a result of Anglo-American influenc­es.
The first Baptist congregation was organized in 1848 and in 1873 the first Methodist Episcopal congregation was organized. In 1878 the Swedish Mission Covenant was organized, a free church that grew out of the Evangelical National Foundation, a movement for renewal within the Church of Sweden. In part the stimulus that led to the formation of this denomination was a doctrinal controversy over Paul Peter Waldenstrom's interpretation of the doctrine of the atonement. He insisted that the New Testament did not teach that Jesus' death was necessary in order to turn aside God's wrath directed against the sinner. Waldenstrom taught that a loving God was always ready freely to forgive the sinner. At this point he took issue with the Lutheran confessions and as a result the Mission Covenant in its constitution did not adopt any confessions, basing its teaching simply on the Holy Scriptures.6
Religious Education and Religious Pluralism
General public education began in Sweden in 1842 with the introduction of the obligatory folk school. The church strongly supported public education so that the laity might be enabled to read the Bible and the catechism. These schools provided the setting for the church's catechetical instruction, the teaching of evangelical Lutheran doctrine, with its goal of forming persons into Christian members of society. The diocesan cathedral chapters were responsible for the preparation of teachers, while in the parishes the education provided was given under the supervision of the senior pastor. It was not until 1930 that the supervision of these schools became a communal rather than a churchly affair.7
The first adaptation of the religious education curriculum to the religious pluralism that had developed in Sweden, occurred in 1919 when it was decided to remove Luther's Small Catechism from the folk school religious education curriculum.8 By this time it was recognized that various groups, such as the labor movement, the temperance movement, and the free churches all had a legitimate interest in the schools. The non-confessional stance of the Mission Covenant and the Baptists contributed to the decision. While the school was to remain Christian, it was to have a more general religious orientation. In the place of the Catechism greater stress was to be placed on biblical texts, especially those imparting moral teaching that would be acceptable to all. Much attention was given to the Sermon on the Mount. The aim of this education was to promote moral development.
In the decades that followed, two important problems were considered: the question of religious freedom and the question of how to develop a curriculum that could be common for all. Two important reports dealt with these questions, the 1940 skolutredning (school investigation) and the 1946 skolkommission (school commis­sion).
The 1940 report took note of the 1919 curricular plan and stressed Christianity as a communal factor that could contribute to the nurture of citizens. Pupils were therefore not only to be taught empirically verifiable facts but should be given an experience of how important the religious and historical fellowship is. The 1946 report, on the other hand, stressed the ideals of democratization and secularization. It regarded religion as a private affair. Ethical nurture should not be related to a particular religious-ethical ideal, but to a more general humanistic one. No single ethical alternative should be preferred, but several options should be presented with the decision being made by the individual, concerning both personal and social issues. At the same time it was presupposed that the instruction would indicate the community's need for such ethical norms as honesty, helpfulness, and the willingness to cooperate.9
The next important date concerning religious education in Sweden is the 1951 law granting the right of unconditional withdrawal from the Church of Sweden. The Swedish Parliament (riksdag) had expressed
itsel
f in favor of such a law in 1909 and the bishops and the church assembly had given their support to this idea in 1929, but not until 1951 was this law enacted. The right to teach Christianity in the public schools was given to members of a specified list of Swedish denominations, as well as to those who in writing stated that they did not hold views in conflict with the teachings of evangelical Christianity. There was discussion of whether one could teach independently of one's own convictional orientation and there began to be reference to objective religious education. Further implications of the 1951 religious freedom law were drawn in 1962 when the nine-year Comprehensive School (grundskolan) was established and received its first curricular plan. According to this plan the school became non-confessional and the Church of Sweden no longer had any formal influence on the school. Pupils were to be given informa­tion
about Christianity and other religions. The plan stated that the instruction was to be objective.
With regard to the development from 1919 to 1962, in the former year Christianity was accepted as providing the primary motivation for the communal ethic. One sought to interpret Christianity in such a way that it could be accepted by as many as possible. In 1962 (even though statistically for most of the population Christianity was still the basis for the communal ethic) as secularization had progressed, the fact that many were choosing to base the communal ethic on other convictional orientations was also recognized. It was assumed, however, that all could agree about certain fundamental democratic values. The Curricular Plan (läroplan för grundskolan, 1962) stated:
Through its ethical nurture the school shall give the pupil a good understanding of the moral norms which must apply as people live together and which undergird the order of law in a democratic community. He must become fully conscious of the meaning of ethical concepts such as justice, honesty, consideration and tolerance, and of the consequences of infractions against laws and precepts.... The main task of the social nurture, which the school's teaching is also to include, is to awaken respect for truth and justice, for human dignity, for inviolability of human life and thereby for the right to personal integrity.10
In 1969 the Comprehensive School received its second Curricular Plan (Igr 69). What had been called "teaching about Christianity" now was renamed "teaching about religion." The requirement that the instruction be objective remained. It was to be factual and compre­hensive
and give such knowledge that the pupil be able to choose from among different life orientations. The school itself was to be neutral.
In the Curricular Plan of 1980 there was a new development in . that religious education was to concentrate on the pupils' life questions, as well as matters having to do with the environment. Pupils were to receive "a widened understanding of the Christian religion with the Bible in the center," but at the same time they should be enabled to compare the Christian heritage with other religious traditions, so that they could see how basic vital questions are answered in the context of different life orientations. That there are valuable contributions in the religious traditions many immi­grants
have brought to Sweden was to be acknowledged. The values of other cultures were to be respected, though anything that strives against the basic values of Swedish democracy was to be resisted.11 Sweden has responded to the fact that immigrants have brought with them many different religious traditions. In the last three grades (7-9) of the Comprehensive School, religion has been included in the field of social studies, which also include social science, history, religion, and geography. In a two-volume textbook combining these different subjects, written for the seventh and eighth grades by Arne Lindquist and Jan Wester, besides Christianity the following religions are studied: Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, religions of China and Japan, and primitive religions.12 Sven-Åke Selander points out that in the curricular plans from 1962 to 1980 there was a develop­ment
from a closed to an open curriculum, from concentrating on Christianity to concentrating on community. Whereas earlier one had sought scientifically to describe and objectively to present Chris­tianity,
one now sought to describe and present religion and life orientation. In the place of terms such as "God," one now used more open ones such as "life."13
The most recent development is to be found the Curricular Plan of 1994." Its name has been changed from the "Curricular Plan for the Comprehensive School and the Gymnasium" to the "Curricular Plan for the Obligatory School System and the Voluntary School Forms." The plan opens with this statement of basic values:
The public school system rests on the basis of democracy. . . The school has an important task to transmit and make secure in the pupils the values that our social life rests upon. The inviolability of human life, the freedom and integrity of the individual, the equal value of all persons, the equality of women and men, as well as solidarity with the weak and the vulnerable, are the values that the school shall form and transmit. In accordance with the ethic prescribed by Christian tradition and Western humanism this happens through the individual's nurture toward a sense of justice, generosity, tolerance, and taking responsibility. The instruction in the school shall be non-confessional. The task of the school is to let each pupil find her/his unique identity and thereby be able to participate in the life of the community through giving her/his best in responsible freedom.15
Swedish curricular plans contain course descriptions. Somewhat new in 1994 as far as religion is concerned, is that both the content of religious knowledge and its existential aspect are to be held together. Pupils are to be given the possibility to use their own reflections and questions in working with existential and ethical problems so as to be able to arrive at a position of their own. They are to be made acquainted with the Christian tradition but also with such alternatives to the traditional religions as agnostic and atheistic life orientations.16 Selander states that there has been development in the understanding of objectivity from the interpretation in the 1960s, that one could not influence the pupils, to the view that one may now help them with their problems as they think about what life orientation they have or would want to have. One does not prescribe what the choice should be; objectivity consists in helping pupils with problems that arise as they think about these matters. At the same time one provides factual and comprehensive information about the alternatives that might be considered. Selander also states that in this new curricular plan the religion requirement at the gymnasium level (grades 10-12), where there are a number of programs among which pupils may choose, has been increased so that those attending schools offering vocational instruction will also study religion. These students were formerly not required to study this subject during their last three years. The older conception that a Swedish understanding of democracy was sufficient as a basis for ethical behavior has, furthermore, been questioned. It is now being recognized that the religious as well as non-religious foundations on which the idea of Swedish democracy rests should be studied by all the pupils, whichever of the options they choose for the last three years of the one-to-twelve-year educational system.17
Quite clearly Sweden has come a long way in the 400 years since the Uppsala Assembly of 1593, when significant religious unity was achieved. During the last two centuries pluralism in faith and life orientations has developed in this Nordic country. Along with the Church of Sweden there are several free churches. Marxism, human­ism,
and atheism have been proposed as viable life orientations and recent immigration has brought religions such as Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism to Sweden. Nonetheless the nation continues to require the inclusion of religious education throughout its twelve-year public educational system.
II
When Sweden and the United States are compared, it must at the outset be stated that there is no event in American history like the Uppsala Assembly of 1593, when for Sweden the Lutheran interpreta­tion
of Christianity became established. Instead, the USA has come to adopt the principle that religion should as much as possible be separated from the governmental process and consequently also from education that is publicly supported. This latter implication of the nonestablishment principle was not at first fully recognized. In order to understand how the principle of nonestablishment came to imply the exclusion of the study of religion from public education, we must examine the history of education in the USA.
The story begins with the colonial period. Prior to the American Revolution, there were three main divisions in the European settle­ment
on the east coast of North America: the New England, the Middle, and the Southern colonies. The New England colonies were settled by dissenters from the Church of England, who thought of themselves as a new Israel with a divine commission to establish a godly commonwealth in the American wilderness. Early on they established schools. Boston Latin School dates back to 1635 and Harvard University, the oldest one in North America, was founded in 1636. The spirit of the Puritan founders of Harvard is expressed in these words:
After God had carried us safe to New England, and wee had builded our houses, provided necessaries for our livelihood, rear'd convenient places for God's worship and settled the Civill Government; One of the next things we longed for, and looked after, was to advance Learning and perpetuate it to Posterity; dreading to leave an illiterate Ministry to the churches, when our present ministers shall lie in the dust.18
In the Middle colonies there was much less homogeneity in the population. In New York and Delaware there were remnants of Dutch and Swedish colonies that had been taken over by the British. In Pennsylvania many Germans had settled. While all of these groups were Protestant, in Maryland there were Roman Catholics. The absence of a common language and the lack of religious uniformity made it difficult to establish common schools, as in New England. The elementary education that was to be found, was provided in private schools or by the different religious groups in each communi­ty.
It took much longer in the Middle colonies to establish institutions of higher education. The oldest university in this section of the country is Princeton, founded in 1746, more than a century after the founding of Harvard.
In the Southern colonies the dominant church during the colonial period was the established Church of England. Here the College of William and Mary was founded in Williamsburg, Virginia, in 1693. There were, however, three problems that the Southern colonies faced. The nature of the first settlements was quite different from those in New England. Those who sponsored these settlements were primarily interested in financial profits that were to be returned to England. The earliest immigrants in Virginia have been described as "alumni of the Elizabethan and Jacobean culture of poverty, who had no intention of working, who squabbled with each other and fought with the Indians, and who died of mysterious diseases."19 When later a plantation economy based on tobacco and slavery developed, families lived on large land holdings and were scattered over large areas, so that it was difficult to form either congregations or schools for the children. Finally, during and after the Revolutionary War, the identification of the Church of England with the British government, against which the colonists had revolted, weakened its influence in these colonies. The Church had, however, not given much attention to education and the State did not consider education its responsibili­ty,
either. There were tutors in homes, some small private schools, and a few pauper schools for children of the poorer classes.20
These differences between the colonies help explain why the dominant influence in the formation of early American culture during the colonial period and for some time thereafter came from Puritan New England. In much of New England the Congregational churches were established, in the sense that they were publicly supported and linked with the government of each local community. In Massachu­setts
they so remained until 1833. Though the Church of England was established in some of the other colonies, as far as the nation itself was concerned, it was evident that the model of a federal ecclesiasti­cal
establishment would not be acceptable. Immediately upon the adoption of the federal Constitution, Congress proposed ten amend­ments,
known as the Bill of Rights. The first of these begins: "Con­gress
shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."21 It is through this amendment, adopted in 1791, that separation of church and state has come to characterize American society.
Two things should be noted about this section of the First Amendment. First, when it was adopted it applied only to the federal government. In 1791 only Virginia and Rhode Island had full disestablishment,22 though there was a growing number of Americans who belonged to religious groups, such as the Baptists, who in Europe had experienced suppression from established churches and who were opposed in principle to granting one religious group the privilege and power that establishment would provide. Thus, while this amendment did not make such a church-state relationship illegal on the state level, it was perhaps inevitable that the nonestablishment principle, due to increasing religious pluralism, would eventually be extended to the states. As new states adopted constitutions, many of them borrowed this language from the federal Constitution. The second thing to be noted is that no thought had been given to the implications of the nonestablishment principle as far as education was concerned. There is no reference to education in either the federal Constitution or the Federalist Papers. In the Middle and Southern states education was provided, for the most part, either in private or parish schools; it is possible that no extensive involvement of even local government in the educational process was anticipated. In New England, where there were publicly supported common schools, it was understood that the First Amendment applied only to the federal government, which had not yet begun to concern itself with educa­tion.
23
New England, despite the strict Calvinism of its established Congregational churches, was not immune to the religious pluralism that was beginning to make itself felt throughout all the states. The Puritan requirement of experienced conversion for full church membership had been changed so that there could be a "half-way covenant" for those who were baptized but had not been converted. This half-way covenant did. not admit them to holy communion but did permit them to have their children baptized. In the middle of the 18th century a revival, the Great Awakening, swept through the colonies dividing old denominations and creating new ones. Some theologians, who reacted negatively to certain aspects of the revival, took a more optimistic view of human nature than was taught by the orthodox Calvinists. They also stressed the humanity of Jesus and began to question the doctrine of the Trinity. This kind of thinking eventually led to division in the Congregational churches in eastern Massachusetts so that most of them became Unitarian. All of this obviously resulted in considerable doctrinal controversy.24
Some of the defenders of orthodoxy were unwise in their strict interpretation of Calvinism. One of them, Nathanael Emmons, was minister in Franklin, Massachusetts, for fifty-four years. In his rural parish lived the family of Horace Mann, who was to be the first secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education. In 1810, when Horace was 14 years old, his older brother, Stephen, drowned on a Sunday, having failed to attend the service that day. At his funeral Nathanael Emmons spoke of the terrible last judgment and the lake that burns with fire and brimstone and left no doubt as to Stephen's eternal fate. Horace reacted strongly against such teaching and later became a Unitarian25 In 1827, probably in reaction to the doctrinal controversies that attended the emergence of the Unitarian denomina­tion
in 1825, the Massachusetts legislature enacted a law stating that the Committee on Education "shall never direct any school books to be purchased or used, in any schools under their superintendence, which are calculated to favor any particular religious sect or tenet."26 Horace Mann became secretary of the Board of Education in 1837. He was in full agreement with the 1827 law and proposed that in the place of sectarian doctrines, ethics and only what can be known about God through a study of nature be taught in the common schools. With respect to Christianity, he argued that, since its teachings must be found in the Bible, reading the Bible without comment or interpre­tation
should be sufficient.27
Horace Mann's way of solving the problem of defining the religious element in public education set the pattern for public schools in other parts of the nation. Not everyone was satisfied. Some thought that what Mann said should be taught about religion, sounded too Unitarian. Those least satisfied were Roman Catholics, who through immigration were becoming increasingly numerous. They regarded the common Christianity being taught in the public schools as a watered-down Protestantism. The King James Version of the Bible that was being read was to them a Protestant Bible. As to reading it without comment, Roman Catholics insisted that to understand the Bible one needed the guidance of the church.28
Roman Catholics proposed that instead of common schools there should be tax support for confessional schools, chosen according to parental preference. This proposal the Protestants opposed, since they felt that common schools were essential to achieve national unity. In order, however, to make the public schools as acceptable as possible to the Roman Catholics, Protestants agreed to the removal of more and more explicit religious content from the curriculum. This did not satisfy the Roman Catholics; where they could, especially in urban areas, they established their own schools. A few other denominations, among them some Lutherans, have done the same. Most Protestants, however, have supported the public school, since they have felt that the home and the local congregation could adequately supplement the education received in the public school.
In the development thus far surveyed, it should be emphasized that there was no intentional exclusion of religious teaching as such from the public schools. It was taken for granted that religion belonged in public education, but those in charge of the public schools simply could not cope with the problem of religious plural­ism.
Almost all specific religious teaching appeared to be sectarian and thus it was feared that teaching it under state auspices would violate someone's rights of conscience.
While the nonestablishment of religion provision in the federal Constitution was, as indicated above, often written into state constitutions, it was through the 14th Amendment adopted in 1868 that this principle was made applicable in all the states. The 14th Amendment had as its purpose to make certain that individual southern states would not deprive the recently freed slaves of the rights that should, following their emancipation, be theirs as free United States citizens. While this amendment did not effectively safeguard the rights of black citizens, it has in this century provided the basis for important civil rights decisions. The United States Supreme Court interpreted the 14th Amendment to mean that all the rights and freedoms provided in the other amendments, which had originally referred only to the federal government, could now be claimed in all the other governmental jurisdictions. Thus the federal nonestablishment principle became applicable not only to all the states, whether their constitutions contained such a provision or not, but also to each local school board.
Within the last fifty years this implication of the 14th Amendment has led to a series of changes as far as religion in the public schools is concerned. Suits have been filed by parents who have claimed that the rights of their children have been violated by released time religious education classes held on school premises,29 by the recitation of a prayer prescribed by the state board of education,30 or by the reading without comment of some verses from the Bible each day.31 This latter Schempp Decision of 17 June 1963, in which the Supreme Court ruled that Pennsylvania law may not require the reading of at least ten verses from the Holy Bible without comment at the opening of each public school on each school day, has had a somewhat unexpected consequence. Mr. Justice Tom Clark in stating the decision observed that education is not complete without a knowl­edge
of the history of religion, comparative religion, and the Bible. He added: "Nothing that we have said here indicates that such study of the Bible or of religion, when presented objectively as part of a secular program of education, may not be effected consistent with the First Amendment."32
A decade earlier a report issued in 1951 by the Educational Policies Commission of the National Educational Association of the US and the American Association of School Administrators stated that there should be teaching about moral and spiritual values in the public schools:
The American people have rightly expected the schools of this country to teach moral and spiritual values. The schools have
accepted this responsibility No society can survive without
a moral order. A system of moral and spiritual values is indispensable to group living.33
Ten values were listed: 1) The supreme importance of individual personality. 2) Each person should accept moral responsibility. 3) Institutions are the servants of mankind. 4) Mutual consent is better than violence. 5) The human mind should be liberated by access to information and opinion. 6) Excellence in mind, character, and creative ability should be fostered. 7) All persons should be judged by the same moral standards. 8) Brotherhood should take precedence over selfish interest. 9) Each person should have the greatest possible opportunity for the pursuit of happiness, provided only that such activities do not substantially interfere with the similar opportunities of others. 10) Each person should be offered the emotional and spiritual experiences which transcend the materialistic aspects of life.34 The Report went on to state:
American democracy cannot select any system of religious faith as the sole basis for the values to which all Americans sub­scribe.
Nevertheless these moral and spiritual values them­selves
command, with minor exceptions, the allegiance of all thoughtful Americans. . . . However we may disagree on religious creeds, we can agree on moral and spiritual values. . . . The public schools should teach all children a decent respect for the religious opinions of mankind and the basic facts concerning the role of religion in the history and culture of mankind. . . . There can be no doubt that the American democracy is grounded in a religious tradition. While religion may not be the only source for democratic moral and religious values, it is surely one of the important sources.35
III
Given the statements in the Report of the Educational Policies Commission, which are similar to what one finds in Swedish curricular plans, and the opinion of Mr. Justice Clark in the Schempp Decision, that objective study of the Bible or of religion in the public schools can be consistent with the First Amendment, why is there nonetheless such a difference between Swedish and American public education with respect to teaching in this area?36 The major reason for the difference is that such teaching can be controversial and those who make decisions about curricular matters in American public schools want as much as possible to avoid controversy. A contribut­ing
factor is that American public education is extremely decentral­ized.
Each state has its own department of education that sets general standards and administers state aid to local school districts, while more specific decisions about the curriculum are made in the local school district. Local school boards are very responsive to parental pressure, fearful of becoming vulnerable to lawsuits, and worried lest negative community attitudes could result in defeat of referendums to authorize needed additional funding. There are strong reasons, therefore, to avoid any teaching with which parents in the district might not agree.
The situation is quite different, however, in Sweden. There decisions about the curriculum are made and enforced nationally. Recently Sweden's Supreme Administrative Court required the Östergötland County Council to remove wording about Christian ethics it had introduced into the curricular plan for the schools of that county. The County Council was told that in revising the language of the national curricular plan it had exceeded its authority.37 The court decision did not mean that there was not to be teaching about Christian ethics but that the description of such teaching for the schools of Östergötland County had to correspond to the description in the national curricular plan.
On the American scene how controversial moral education can be, is clearly seen when sex education is considered. Despite the need for such education, given the rise of teen-age pregnancy and the spread of AIDS,38 it is extremely difficult to introduce this subject into the public school curriculum. Even with sex education being excluded, proponents of a legislative program called "Contract with America," presently being advanced by Republicans in the US House of Representatives, are in effect saying that there is now too much controversial moral education in the public schools. The Contract states that it is through the family that values such as responsibility, morality, commitment, and faith are learned, and that values of the family are under attack from the education establishment. The Contract therefore proposes legislation to "strengthen the rights of parents to protect their children against education programs that undermine the values taught in the home."39 Pitting families and schools against each other on the issue of moral education is extremely unfortunate, for moral education, whether it is so called or not, cannot successfully be excluded from public education. In Shakespeare's play The Merchant of Venice, Shylock has to realize that he cannot cut from Antonio a pound of flesh without also shedding blood. So also religious and ethical questions are implicit throughout all the areas of general education. Moral education should be a cooperative enterprise in which parents, churches and their functional equivalents, and schools all participate. Ways must be found to develop meaningful dialogue on the issues involved so that "culture war" can be avoided.40
An important question in this connection is whether all moral education need be prescriptive. In the case of moral norms, such as honesty, respect for human dignity, acceptance of individual responsibility, the school can be prescriptive in its teaching. Norms of this kind are noncontroversial and without there being explicit reference to moral education, there is teaching about them throughout the curriculum. With respect to some other moral issues, differing possible options must be considered. Examples of such issues are: Asking whether national self-interest should be the primary consider­ation
in US relations with Third World nations. Does justice have the same meaning for all US citizens? How can the often claimed right of the individual to bear arms be related to the inviolability of human life? What is meant by human life; when does human life that should be held inviolable begin and when does it end? Is equality between women and men a goal toward which any society should strive? What should be done to remove what remains of discrimina­tory
practices against racial and other minorities? To examine questions of this kind can be controversial. Objectivity here requires that the teaching be factual and as comprehensive as possible.
One way to deal with controversial moral differences is to recognize the extent to which they are rooted in differences in religious faith. If this is to be done, moral education must also include teaching about religion. A helpful way to understand the importance of religion for the common life of a community is to compare the community to a tree. The roots that support the more visible trunk and leafy branches are the differing faiths to be found in the community. That there are several such roots can be a source of strength rather than weakness. The trunk is the de facto moral consensus that enables the citizens to live and work together. This consensus must again and again be renegotiated. The leafy branches are the differences in both religious practice and moral behavior that in a pluralistic society are permitted to flourish. Religious faith that is foundational in any society has a dual relationship with moral behavior. On the one hand, some moral imperatives derive directly from religious faith. It can be helpful in deliberations about moral issues to know how this derivation occurs, why one faith calls for one kind of moral behavior and why another prompts different moral judgments. Another relationship between religious faith and moral behavior, is that faith provides the individual with the motive to do what she/he is persuaded is good or right.
Three distinctively different kinds of motivation for moral behavior are: 1) One is motivated by sanctions, the threat of pun­ishment
if one does what is wrong, the hope for reward if one does what is right. While these sanctions here and now are administered by the society in which one lives, one believes that behind them is a transcendent lawgiver, who will ultimately correct earthly sanctions insofar as they are in error and reward or punish either in this life or in a life to come. 2) One is motivated by self-interest and believes the world is so ordered that through diligent effort one's desires for various goods can be satisfied. One conforms to the ethical norms of the community in which one lives in order to be successful in one's striving. With respect to the similar striving of others one may believe that there is an invisible hand that brings forth from the self-interested striving of the many the greatest good of all. There can also be a negative form of this faith. If one is convinced human desire for the most part cannot be satisfied, the appropriate behavior is to curb it and even seek to root it out. 3) One is motivated by gratitude. One believes that one has been loved, by parents and many others, ultimately by the presence in history of a transcendent, redemptive and creative community-forming love. This love defines one's obligations and provides guidance as to how one satisfies one's own desires and responds to the desires of others.41 These different kinds of motivation represent different ways of answering the fundamental religious question, What do/may I/we believe and hope? The question as formulated implies that one already does believe and hope in some way, but it is also possible that this convictional orientation could change, for there are several viable religious options. The two verbs "believe" and "hope" are needed because we believe in the present (which belief may also involve an interpretation of the past), but we also anticipate with more or less hope the future, no matter how distantly that future may be projected. Many people are not fully conscious of how they are actually answering this fundamental religious question. A part of the educational task is to help them gain self-knowledge at this point. As this is done it is essential to recognize that the religious question can be answered in a number of fundamentally different ways.
It should be possible in public education to examine the possible answers to the religious question, especially as they relate to the possible answers to the ethical question (What should/ought I/we do?). It will be helpful if there is general agreement by all that these questions must in fact be answered by everyone. Just as it is impossible to be amoral, in the sense that one simply ignores the moral question, so, if the religious question is as broadly defined as proposed above, everyone believes and hopes in some way. Since the options suggested above are faith options, no one of them is "true" to the exclusion of the others. They are also rationally incommensurable, there being no common standard in terms of which they can be evaluated. How the options differ can be recognized and each person finds herself/himself believing and hoping in one or another of the ways indicated. At the same time, despite the significant differences between the faith and hope options, and the moral implications derived from them, a de facto moral consensus can be defined so as to make possible communal life. Education in the public sector about religion and ethics can help to define this consensus, thus contribut­ing
to the necessary unity communal life requires. It can also have the effect of strengthening particular faith communities. In a religiously pluralistic society there is much to gain if there is objective teaching about religion and ethics both in the public schools and in its various religious communities.
Notes
1 G. Everett Arden, Augustana Heritage: A History of the Augustana Lutheran Church (Rock Island, Ill.: Augustana Press, 1963), 106.
2 Knut B. Westman, Uppsala möte och dess betydelse (Stockholm: Svenska kyrkans diakonistyrelses bokförlag, 1943), 22.
'Much of what follows on the effort to maintain religious unity in Sweden, as well as the subsequent progress toward religious freedom is derived from Åke Andrén, "Religionsfrihet," Nordisk teologisk uppslagsbok (hereafter abbreviated as NTU), III, 290-293.
4 Eje Berling, "Skolväsen," Svensk uppslagsbok, vol. 26, 346-348. 'Hilding Pleijel, "Pietism," NTU, III, 57-63.
'William Bredberg, "Svenska Missionsförbundet" and "Paul Peter Waldenström," NTU, III, 731-735, 1099-1103.
'Birgit Lehndahls, Religion i skolan - men hur? (Uppsala: EFS förlaget, 1986), 65-66; Ejje Berling, op cit, 350.
8 For a summary account of the development in Swedish religious education from 1919-1980, see Birgit Lehndahls, op. cit., 66-67. For a more detailed discussion, see Karl-Göran Algotsson, Från katekestvång till religionsfrihet. Debatten om religionsunder­visningen
i skolan under 1900-talet, Skrifter utgivna av Statsvetenskapliga Föreningen i Uppsala, nr. 70, 1975.
9 Sven-Åke Selander, Religionsundervisning för hela människan. Analys av samspelet samhälle, människosyn, innehall och metoder i religionsundervisningen i Sverige (Lund: Lunds Universitet, Lärarhögskolan i Malmö, utvecklingsarbete och fältförsök, 22,1982), 67-68. I wish to express my deep appreciation to Sven-Åke Selander, who has been of great assistance to me in preparing this article, through correspondence and the literature he has sent me. Professor Selander formerly taught at Lund University's Teachers College and now teaches in its Theological Faculty.
10 Selander, 1982, 99-100. Selander cites the 1962 läroplan för grundskolan, 16,18. "läroplan för grundskolan 1980 (Stockholm: Liber UtbildningsFörlaget, 1980), 121. "Arne Lindquist & Jan Wester, SAMS (Örebro: Esselte studium, 1987-88), vol. 1-2. "Selander, 1982,134.
14 Läroplan för det obligatoriska skolväsendet och de frivilliga skolformerna, Lpo-Lpf 94, Statens skolverks författningssamling (SKOLFS) 1994. aIbid., 5. "Ibid., 38-39.
17 From personal correspondence with Professor Selander, 31 December 1994, and 12 February 1995.
""Harvard University," Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1964, vol. 11,137.
19 The description is taken from a brief review of Jamestown: 1544-1699 by Carl Bridenbaugh (Oxford), in The New Yorker, vol. 56 (14 April 1980), 175.
20 Ellwood P. Cubberley, "Education: United States," Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1941, vol. 7, 991.
21 The Constitution of the United States, Amendment 1.
22 David B. Tyack, "Church-State Relations in Education, History," The Encyclopedia of Education (Macmillan and Free Press, 1971), vol. 2, 114.
23 It can be noted that Massachusetts and Connecticut were two of the three states that failed to ratify the ten amendments that form the Bill of Rights, Massachusetts not doing so until 1941, the 150th anniversary of the Bill of Rights' ratification. Alfred H. Kelley and Winfrid A. Harbison, The American Constitution, Its Origin and Development, 4th ed. (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1970), 176; Broadus Mitchell and Louise Pearson Mitchell, A Biography of the Constitution of the United States (New York: Oxford U. Press, 1964), p. 204.
24 For a more detailed account of this development, see Sydney E. Ahlstrom, A Religious History of the American People (New Haven: Yale U. Press, 1972), 387-403.
25 William Kailer Dunn, What Happened to Religious Education? (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1958), 122-126. Raymond B. Culver, Horace Mann and Religion in the Massachusetts Public Schools (New Haven: Yale U. Press, 1929), 226-227, states that Dr. Emmons addressed in his funeral sermon the subject of "dying unconverted," implying that this had happened in Stephen's case.
26 Dunn, op. cit., 104.
27 Ibid., 141,149
28 Ibid., 267-270.
291948 Illinois ex rel. McCullum v. Board of Education (333 U.S. 203). 301962 Engel v. Vitale (370 U.S. 421).
311963 School District Abington Township v. Schempp (374 U.S. 203) and Murray v. Curlett (374 U.S. 203).
32 (374 U.S. 225), 83A, S. Ct. 1573. See Nicholas Woltersdorff, "Religion in the Public Schools," The Encyclopedia of Education, vol. 7,469, and Clark Spurlock, "Supreme Court of the United States and Education," Ibid., vol. 8, 568.
33 Moral and Spiritual Values in the Public Schools, Educational Policies Commission, National Education Association of the US, and the American Association of School Administrators, Washington, DC, 1951, 3. Among the twenty members of the Educational Policies Commission was Dwight D. Eisenhower, then president of Columbia University.
34 Ibid., 18-29. The elaboration of the eighth value of brotherhood included this statement "Our ideal is the good Samaritan, rattier than the man who asked whether he must be his brother's keeper." 27.
"Ibid., 33, 73. 36 After the Schempp Decision, some efforts were made to introduce objective teaching about religion in some secondary schools. Budgetary restrictions have, however, curtailed these programs in recent years. There has been a greater expansion of religious studies in public universities.
37 Sydsvenska dagbladet snällposten, Malmö, 15 February 1995, A6. This newspaper item was called to my attention by Professor Bo Johnson of the University of Lund.
38See "Remarks by Rep. Newt Gingrich," 11 November 1994. Contract with America, Ed Gillespie & Bob Schellhas, eds. (New York: Time Books, 1994), 182. ^Ibid., 79.
40 A recent news item stated: "Educators and religious parents fighting a bitter 'culture war' over the future of U.S. public schools signed a pledge in Arlington, Va., to tone down their rhetoric and cooperate for children's good. The agreement won't resolve such issues as prayer in school, teaching creationism and sex education. But the 17 groups—from the Christian Coalition to the People for the American Way—pledged to work to solve disputes before they become lawsuits, improve communication and respect each other's positions." Star Tribune, Minneapolis, Minn., 22 March 1995, A7. For a discussion of the phenomenon known as "culture war," see James Davison Hunter, Culture Wars: The Struggle to Define America (New York: Basic Books, 1991).
41 These three patterns of motivation are my interpretation of what Anders Nygren called the nomos, eros, and agape motifs. See Anders Nygren, Agape and Eros, rev. trans. Philip S. Watson (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1953); Bernhard Erling, Nature and History: A Study in Theological Methodology with Special Attention to the Method of Motif Research (Lund: C.W.K. Gleerup, 1960); "Motif Research Analysis and the Existence and Nature of God," Perspective, 10 (1969), 155-67.